The Magdalene Suicides
by Coin
Summary: Romance in the dirtiest form.((features Skittery and Jack and a female OC)).


.-.-.-.I own _Newsies _so screw you Disney. Just kidding…I of course don't. The title is a play on _The Virgin Suicides_. I own Mairead…please don't take her without asking.-.-.-.

_...---...---...---..._

_Well she could keep everything from me  
I could have been anyone you'd seen  
She's nothing but porcelain underneath her skin_

**The Counting Crows**

Alice Belton was, to put it in the nicest of terms, pissed off. The entire city was in a state of chaos because the newsboys were on strike and her business couldn't get past them.  
  
"Them boys know they're not gonna win, why are they bothering?" Alice asked. The question was out in the air, for anyone to answer, but no one could figure out why.  
  
"It's called hope. We all have it, just some people choose to use it and some people choose to ignore it," Mairead responded. The girls looked up from their stinking bottles of nail varnish and tubes of bright red lipstick because when Mairead spoke, everyone listened. She was at least three years younger than most of them but she seemed wise beyond her years and the girls responded to that.  
  
"Well I don' like 'em anyway. Dey don't make enough money to give us any business," someone responded as she doused herself with perfume. This was true. Not to mention the fact that most of them were still boys. They didn't know about this world. In one city there are dozens of cities in their own right. Societies within societies. The newsies may have lived only five minutes away, but their life might as well have been in an entire different country than Mairead's.  
  
The subject was quickly changed to something along the lines of corsets and lacy lingerie while Mairead still thought of the boys. She headed towards the window and onto the fire escape and glanced down the street. You couldn't see them but you could hear their cries of "Strike, Strike" loud and clear. She smirked at the thought of how much fun that would be.  
  
Taking a seat on the hard metal she began to hum the tune of _Happy Birthday_ to herself. Tears began to slowly glide down her cheeks. They stained her makeup in little lines as she sobbed silently. For herself, for the newsies, for everything. At this point she didn't need a reason to cry.  
  
"Happy Birthday Mairead," she whispered. She heard a door open and looked up; it was her boss. He was one of the younger bosses in the city. He was newly married and treated the girls with the utmost respect. Mairead stood and climbed back in through the window.  
  
"Mairead I have a job for you, be down in five minutes," the statement was simple but it implied so much. Running over to a mirror Mairead stained her lips red and fixed her black curls. The red looked ridiculous against her sallow skin but it was considered beautiful…even if she disagreed with that thought. Finally she dried her blue eyes.  
  
"Whoever it is must like 'em young," Alice remarked. Turning on her heal Mairead was ready to defend herself.  
  
"He must like them to know what they're at, guess that's why you weren't asked" the girls giggled and she was proud with the reception. "See ya girls."  
  
Off she ran down the stairs. She was sixteen now, a woman. No longer would she be scared of the big, drunk men that came to sleep with her for money. And then she saw him. He wasn't too bad, there had been worse, but Mairead was frozen with fear.  
  
"Hello sir," was all she could squeak out.  
  
"Hello miss, pleasure to meet you," he offered her his arm and being as well trained as she was, she took it. Up they went to a room, the best room in the whole house, and sat down on a couch. Mairead knew who to become and went into graceful and sexy mode.  
  
"So what do you do for a living?" she asked as he fixed her a glass of whiskey.  
  
"I'm a foreman on one of the docks," she smiled as he sat down next to her.  
  
"I can tell by your strong arms," she responded as she took a gulp of her drink. The best part of being a high class whore, in her opinion, was that your clients always gave you drinks. Being drunk kept your mind off of what was going on.  
  
She had been blessed with good looks and big breasts that made her good enough for business men. Otherwise, she would have been out on the streets having sex in alleyways instead of in a high class brothel on silk sheets.  
  
He began to kiss her. Slow, wet kisses that tasted of whiskey. She got up and undressed, quickly untying her corset. He took off his clothes and jumped into bed. As he groaned and moved awkwardly Mairead did what she always did. She closed her eyes and prayed, going over the Our Father in her head over and over again until he was done.  
  
Some of the girls chose to enjoy it, some even had their favorites, but Mairead wasn't in agreement with them on that.  
  
**-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-**  
  
A few blocks away and a day later Jack Kelly (or was he Francis Sullivan now?) and David Jacobs, his new best friend and future brother in law, waited to get their papers. A conversation had been started, but it was often interrupted because now the boys were celebrities in their own right.  
  
Skittery was discussing, in depth, how worse life was going to be now with Racetrack. Race was, of course, trying to bet him that it wouldn't, or that it would. Anything really for the rush of a gamble.  
  
Mairead eyed the four boys closely. Especially Jack. His rough hands and even rougher accent. His authority over everyone.  
  
It was her day off so she had decided to do some research. She was dressed in her plainest clothes, which weren't plain at all, and had gladly left off the makeup. Mairead was always desperate to know everything about whatever she knew nothing about; a curiosity that often got her into trouble.  
  
And a crowd of young boys met by Mairead was trouble.  
  
She sauntered over, not too seductive but sexual enough to get their attention. There wasn't a hat on anyone's head while she greeted the boys with a sly wave.  
  
The boys were not sexual creatures like Mairead. All they could do was wave and stare. She almost took it as a sign of their immaturity and was about to leave, but something stopped her.  
  
A boy with rustled dark hair and full lips was aimlessly looking around, depression oozing from his eyes.  
  
She was going to have him. Money or not.  
  
All thoughts of Jack Kelly were not lost however. He was lingering in the back of her mind but he wouldn't be easy. _I'll get this one over with first._  
  
So Mairead walked on…planning her future moves carefully in her head. She looked at the vendor's carts until headlines of "The Newsboys Lose Strike" were yelled.  
  
"One please," she asked politely. She handed the boy far too much money, and Skittery was shocked that a grown girl didn't know the price of a paper.  
  
"Here you go," he handed her five papers, which she had paid for her.  
  
"And what am I going to do with five papers? I certainly can't read_ all_ of them. I only want one. The money is yours…consider it a gift."  
  
"Uhm…why would you give _me_ a gift?"  
  
"Yesterday was my birthday and the only thing exciting that happened was your strike," any other person and Mairead would have been too impatient to continue on, but this boy…he meant something.  
  
"It wasn't my strike. You wanna talk to Jack, the kid with the cowboy hat."  
  
"I don't care about him," she paused and raised her eyes to meet his, "What's your name?"  
  
Skittery knew what_ this_ was about.  
  
And so they met. It went quite simply and innocently at first. If Mairead was naïve she would've been head over heals in love with him, but she had a plan…to steal this boy's innocence.  
  
First they kissed, gently. But gentle went to full fits of passion and kissing went to touching. Touching went to Skitts being snuck into a bedroom at Mairead's. They didn't drink, or talk…just all involving sex.  
  
The other boys didn't mind Mairead. She shocked them with her subtle yet odd behavior; she got them whiskey for their poker nights. Jack was not impressed. Who was this girl? No one knew where she came from, or where she slept at night. Skitts did not know that the brothel they borrowed was also where she worked. In fact he didn't know anything about her.  
  
But she was intoxicating. She was decent looking. She had drink. She was sex, sex, sex. And boys _love _that.  
  
Jack knew she was nothing like his girlfriend, Sarah. People they didn't know could not be trusted and they didn't know Mairead, so Jack chose to dislike her. But Mairead knew the story of how he had shortly betrayed his newsies. His only friends. She used her knowledge against him; she fought back with biting comments.  
  
For some unexplainable reason, Jack liked it. This girl was too baffling for words.  
  
And before Skittery could ask her any questions it was over. She broke it off.  
  
"What we're doing is sinful," she stated and that was it.  
  
The poor boy was incredible confused, and that was perfectly understandable. But it had been too good to last and that was that. Besides, Mairead had plans.  
  
**-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-**  
  
On the weeks moved. No news of Mairead. She had come out of nowhere, terrorized his entire life, and then left like a lamb.  
  
One day he saw her while he was discussing the important things in life with Jack. She was walking down the road; her rosary beads gracing her palms. He smiled and waved, and she came over to talk.  
  
It was colder now and she was decently dressed in black coat. The conversation moved onward and then Skittery had to leave. Jack and Mairead alone.  
  
_Sarah?_ Sarah who?  
  
Their secret affair nearly began. She had kissed him, and Lord knows that he loved it, but then he stopped.  
  
This was truly sinful.  
  
"Whatsa matter with you?" he was angry at her audacity.  
  
"Don't you want me?" Everyone had to want her. Everyone.  
  
"I have a girlfriend," he said determinedly. He stormed away in righteous anger and Mairead was shocked.  
  
"SAY YOU DON'T WANT ME!"  
  
"Fuck off," was all she got.  
  
No one could ever pinpoint when she lost it except for Jack. He had seen the full affect of her rage at the thought of not being desired. The boy knew she was mad and he let her have her temper tantrum.  
  
She ran the whole way home, tears streaming down her cheeks.  
  
The knife was found. The blood was obvious.  
  
The next day the boys leafed through their papers for any good headlines. There on the second page it read, _Young Girl Found Dead in Brothel…cause of death unknown_.  
  
And they screamed it out to the city. No one knew it was Mairead; she was just a way to get money.  
  
She had **always **been a way to get money.  
  
**-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-  
**  
WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME? I've gone mad. This is what high school does to you. Blame this on NPHS.  
  
But I hope you like it. There might be more. Your thoughts on this please. 


End file.
